Sci-Fi Storm

Brother/sister dynamic duo Lana and Andy Wachowski will return to SF with Jupiter Ascending, their first major foray into science fiction since the megahit The Matrix trilogy. Jupiter Ascending is an original idea from the team, and Warner Bros is starting casting for a Spring production start. No details on the plot, but hopefully it turns out better than their last film, the 2008 bomb Speed Racer (although being a fan of the original cartoon, I kinda liked it).

Depending if it could come out more Matrix than Speed Racer, it is expected to be a star vehicle for someone – and potentially a money maker for them as well. Psssst…WB…over here…I’m available…

Deadline just reported that John Orloff (Anonymous, Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga’Hoole) has signed on to write the screenplay for Bryan Singer’s big screen Battlestar Galactica reboot – and Orloff is excited. “I have wanted to write this movie since I was 12 years old, and built a Galactica model from scratch out of balsa wood, cardboard, old model parts and LEDs,” Orloff told Deadline. “I love BSG, and I would pass on the job rather than frak it up.” So it looks like Singer was serious about moving this up in the absence of his King Arthur flick.

OK, this is bizarrely awesome…

But I’m not sure it beats the Muppets version.

The final panel of the Syfy Digital Press Tour was a complete surprise. All we knew was it was an unscripted show with a surprise host, and they wanted volunteers who had to sign a waiver that they were in good health, etc…I volunteered, although I was not selected. I did, however, get an early clue as to what was going on as I was out in the hallway briefly, and one of those electronic signs at convention centers that tell you what is happening where called it a “Total Blackout” panel. But I was told I had to forget everything I saw or I’d be mind wiped or something like that…

The new show is, of course, Total Blackout, based on the hit European game show. In it contestants enter a completely darkened room while filmed by infrared cameras and have to determine objects just by their other senses – objects that could be alive.
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Two of the unscripted panels we had were for the returning make-up competition show Face Off, and the new “follow around” docu-series Monster Man.

Face Off is the reality competition show involving makeup effects artists that just began shooting its second season which will begin airing January 11th at 10pm ET. Host McKenzie Westmore and judge Ve Neill were on hand to talk about the show and tell us about the upcoming season.
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Syfy announced today that they’ve ordered six episodes of the unscripted series School Spirits. From the press release:

SYFY ORDERS SIX EPISODES OF ‘SCHOOL SPIRITS’ FROM EXECUTIVE PRODUCERS MARK BURNETT AND SETH JARRETT

From the Producers of Survivor and Celebrity Ghost Stories Comes A Gripping One-Hour Docu-Series Recounting Tales of Infamous School Hauntings Nationwide

NEW YORK – October 18, 2011 — Syfy orders six, one-hour episodes of the new unscripted series School Spirits from executive producers Mark Burnett (Survivor, The Apprentice) and Seth Jarrett (Celebrity Ghost Stories). The project will tell true ghost stories of hauntings that have happened at schools across the country. The stories will be told in first person narratives through the testimonials of real students, teachers, parents and staff that have encountered the paranormal activity, blended with bone-chilling cinematic reenactments to further bring the haunting experiences to life.
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Our last panel on scripted programming was about Lost Girl, a Canadian show currently in its second season that Syfy has acquired and will join Being Human on Monday nights beginning January 16th at 10pm ET.

Lost Girl follows the story of Bo (Anna Silk), who discovers as a teen that she isn’t human, but instead she’s a succubus, one of the Fae who can drain life energy from others after she kills her love. She later learns of the Fae would, and is told she must choose between the light or the dark Fae – she rebels and considers herself neutral in their conflicts and she tries to protect the humans.
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It was a couple of years ago that Universal confirmed that Bryan Singer planned to reboot Battlestar Galactica as a movie – independently of the more recent re-imagining done by Ronald D. Moore and David Eick, and by reports more directly related to the original created by Glen Larson. Well, it was put in the back burner as there were other things to do – like his remake of Excalibur.

Well, now Blastr is reporting that Excalibur is dead (Warner Bros went with a competing King Arthur story), and that Singer is now moving forward with developing Battlestar Galactica.

I’m not sure if I’m ready for another Galactica so soon. But the way the remake hit parade seems to be going, could we eventually see multiple competing remakes of the same property in development at the same time? Like, let’s say, Paramount brings Star Trek back to TV, while also the J.J. Abrams “alternate timeline” movies keep moving forward? Or say Devlin and Emmerich finally realize their original vision for sequels to Stargate while MGM fires up a new Stargate SG-1 spinoff? What would that do to fans?

The zombies are taking over! Remember all that drama about Frank Darabont leaving as showrunner for AMC’s The Walking Dead? Either it had no effect on the fans, or it seriously boosted interest in the show, as last night’s second season premiere broke records for a basic cable program for the key 18-49 and 25-54 demos (4.8 and 4.2 million respectively), and reached 7.3 million total viewers is the first showing alone (up 38% over the first season premiere), and 11 million for the extra showings that followed.

On this Friday’s all new Sanctuary, Helen and Will are strolling along together through a marketplace seeking information, but it will definitely come at a price. The man feeding them the details they’re paying for assures them that the man they’re seeking will show up soon, and that he comes every day to buy a particular fish. As they start to follow their man they realized there’s a group they believe might be black market traffickers and are posing as competition. Will and Magnus start to lose their target and have to find a way to keep up. Be sure to watch the clip and tune in this Friday at 10/9c to see if Magnus and Will are able to get their man.
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